{"id":2530,"date":"2023-04-03T12:19:54","date_gmt":"2023-04-03T10:19:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.historikertag.de\/Leipzig2023\/?post_type=ht_section&p=2530"},"modified":"2023-04-03T12:19:54","modified_gmt":"2023-04-03T10:19:54","slug":"the-greeks-and-the-power-of-numbers-numbers-and-numerical-information-in-greek-antiquity-and-their-interpretation-in-scholarship","status":"publish","type":"ht_section","link":"https:\/\/www.historikertag.de\/Leipzig2023\/en\/programm\/sektionen\/the-greeks-and-the-power-of-numbers-numbers-and-numerical-information-in-greek-antiquity-and-their-interpretation-in-scholarship\/","title":{"rendered":"The Greeks and the Power of Numbers. Numbers and Numerical Information in Greek Antiquity and Their Interpretation in Scholarship"},"content":{"rendered":"
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In today's public debates, numbers are ubiquitous, and sometimes they even take on a life of their own. Where data is lacking, it is called for, and there is debate over the procedures for generating numbers. However, the importance attributed to numbers in shaping both the future and the construction of the past is culturally determined and not static.<\/p>\n

The full extent to which investigating what was counted, by whom, and why, as well as how the corresponding results were communicated, can be fruitful for the cultural history of ancient Greece has only become apparent in recent decades. While in the past, numerical data in Greek literature was mainly emphasized for historians' use of plausibilities and exaggerated figures, thus employing a pseudo-precise method to create authority, today it is examined more differentiated. For example, numbers were used as a means of illustrating the levels and modalities of certainty and uncertainty of knowledge regarding space and time, and they reflect an intensified mastery of space. At the same time, the question arises as to where the numbers mentioned in ancient literature come from, or to what extent 'statistical' data (such as birth and death registers and military catalogues) were collected in the increasingly literate poleis and whether they were publicly accessible. In any case, quantification and calculation were always important for political decision-making processes.<\/p>\n

The section explores the interplay between the generation of numbers in the Greek poleis and their discursivization, i.e. the methods of counting and the use of numerical data in poetry and prose literature. In addition, quantitative methods in modern research and the foundations of the reconstructed and constructed numerical material for historical interpretations are reflected upon.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"parent":0,"template":"","class_list":["post-2530","ht_section","type-ht_section","status-publish","hentry","ht_section_category-ancient-history","ht_section_location-hs19","ht_section_speaker-athena-kirk","ht_section_speaker-christoph-michels","ht_section_speaker-klaus-freitag","ht_section_speaker-roberta-fabiani","ht_section_speaker-robin-osborne","ht_section_language-deutsch","ht_section_language-englisch"],"acf":{"event_start":"2023-09-20 16:00:00","event_end":"2023-09-20 18:30:00","section_category":[{"term_id":84,"name":"AG","slug":"ancient-history","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":84,"taxonomy":"ht_section_category","description":"Ancient History","parent":0,"count":7,"filter":"raw"}],"section_head":[{"id":1239,"ID":1239,"object_type":"term","PostClass":"Timber\\Post","TermClass":"Term","_children":null,"name":"Christoph Michels","taxonomy":"ht_section_speaker","term_id":1239,"slug":"christoph-michels","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1239,"parent":0,"count":2,"filter":"raw","firstname":"Christoph ","lastname":"Michels","location":"M\u00fcnster","email":""},{"id":1240,"ID":1240,"object_type":"term","PostClass":"Timber\\Post","TermClass":"Term","_children":null,"name":"Klaus Freitag","taxonomy":"ht_section_speaker","term_id":1240,"slug":"klaus-freitag","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1240,"parent":0,"count":2,"filter":"raw","firstname":"Klaus","lastname":"Freitag","location":"Aachen","email":""}],"section_location":{"term_id":1101,"name":"HS19","slug":"hs19","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1101,"taxonomy":"ht_section_location","description":"","parent":0,"count":4,"filter":"raw"},"section_talks":[{"speaker":[{"id":1241,"ID":1241,"object_type":"term","PostClass":"Timber\\Post","TermClass":"Term","_children":null,"name":"Robin Osborne","taxonomy":"ht_section_speaker","term_id":1241,"slug":"robin-osborne","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1241,"parent":0,"count":2,"filter":"raw","firstname":"Robin ","lastname":"Osborne","location":"Cambridge","email":""}],"title":"Epigraphic numbers: who counted what and why?","abstract":"

Greek cities use inscriptions both to record decisions, to register who has been involved in particular activities, and to set down what should be or has been spent. But just as not every decision gets written up on stone, and not every individual involved in running a city has their name formally listed, so what expenses get recorded is selective, and the selection varies from place to place and time to time. This paper examines the use of numbers in Classical Athens and to account for what is being counted, illuminating Athenian practice by comparison with that of cities elsewhere.<\/p>\n"},{"speaker":[{"id":1242,"ID":1242,"object_type":"term","PostClass":"Timber\\Post","TermClass":"Term","_children":null,"name":"Roberta Fabiani","taxonomy":"ht_section_speaker","term_id":1242,"slug":"roberta-fabiani","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1242,"parent":0,"count":2,"filter":"raw","firstname":"Roberta ","lastname":"Fabiani","location":"Rom","email":""}],"title":"Von archivalischen Notizen zu \u00f6ffentlichen Inschriften. Einige \u00dcberlegungen zur strukturierenden Kraft von Zahlen in griechischen Inschriften","abstract":"

Im Mittelpunkt des Vortrags steht die Frage, ob und unter welchen Umst\u00e4nden sich Zahlen auf die Struktur epigraphischer Texte auswirkten. Eine solche strukturierende Kraft der Zahlen scheint manchmal ganz zu fehlen, zuweilen ist sie nur rudiment\u00e4r erkennbar.<\/p>\n

An mehreren Fallbeispielen l\u00e4sst sich indes ein gestalterischer Aufwand im \u00dcbergang von der archivalischen Erfassung zur \u00f6ffentlichen Kommunikation von Zahlen nachvollziehen. Ob bei Schenkungen oder Wettkampfsiegen, die Anordnung der Zahlen stellte mitunter eine narrative Strategie dar, die darauf abzielte, die Verdienste und das Ansehen des Auftraggebers oder des Geehrten (Person oder Gemeinschaft) der Inschrift hervorzuheben.<\/p>\n"},{"speaker":[{"id":1239,"ID":1239,"object_type":"term","PostClass":"Timber\\Post","TermClass":"Term","_children":null,"name":"Christoph Michels","taxonomy":"ht_section_speaker","term_id":1239,"slug":"christoph-michels","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1239,"parent":0,"count":2,"filter":"raw","firstname":"Christoph ","lastname":"Michels","location":"M\u00fcnster","email":""}],"title":"Zwischen Expertenhabitus und Transparenz. Zahlen und Z\u00e4hlen bei den attischen Rednern","abstract":"

Der Vortrag behandelt die Performanz von Zahlenangaben und Alltagsmathematik auf der politischen B\u00fchne des demokratischen Athen. Obgleich die Zurschaustellung von Expertise den Rhetoren half, Autorit\u00e4t vor Volksversammlung und Gerichtsh\u00f6fen zu generieren, geh\u00f6rte es gleicherma\u00dfen zu den Spielregeln der politischen Debatten, in den Reden keine allzu gro\u00dfe Kluft zu den Versammlungsteilnehmern aufkommen zu lassen. Die rhetorische Einbindung von mathematischen Operationen in den Argumentationsgang offenbart dabei Mechanismen der Interaktion des Rhetors mit dem Publikum und damit der Grundlagen politischer Willensbildung der Versammlungsdemokratie.<\/p>\n"},{"speaker":[{"id":1243,"ID":1243,"object_type":"term","PostClass":"Timber\\Post","TermClass":"Term","_children":null,"name":"Athena Kirk","taxonomy":"ht_section_speaker","term_id":1243,"slug":"athena-kirk","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1243,"parent":0,"count":2,"filter":"raw","firstname":"Athena","lastname":"Kirk","location":"Cornell","email":""}],"title":"Toward a Poetics of Counting in Greek Poetry","abstract":"

Scholarship of the past two decades has made clear that the ancient Greeks engaged in modes of counting different from our own, and for a variety of purposes other than our own (e.g. Netz 2002, Cuomo 2012). The technical and cultural operations of numbers in the literary tradition, however, have received less attention. This paper outlines a poetics of counting and numeracy in three poets: Homer, Aristophanes, and Callimachus. In these works, I argue, we can trace an evolving relationship of numeracy to power, in which facility with numbers at first signals political and social authority but subsequently signals something increasingly complex.<\/p>\n"},{"speaker":[{"id":1240,"ID":1240,"object_type":"term","PostClass":"Timber\\Post","TermClass":"Term","_children":null,"name":"Klaus Freitag","taxonomy":"ht_section_speaker","term_id":1240,"slug":"klaus-freitag","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1240,"parent":0,"count":2,"filter":"raw","firstname":"Klaus","lastname":"Freitag","location":"Aachen","email":""}],"title":"Die Zahlen von Flottenkontingenten im Geschichtswerk des Thukydides","abstract":"

In dem Vortrag wird der Befund diskutiert, dass der Athener Historiograph, der einst selbst das Kommando \u00fcber eine Flotte hatte, in seinem Werk viele Zahlen von Flottenkontingenten \u00fcberliefert. Welche Bedeutung kommt aber diesen Zahlenangaben zu? Es wird immer wieder behauptet, dass (pseudoexakte) numerische Details bei antiken Historikern vor allem mit einer gewissen Realisierungssucht und einem Autorisierungsgestus zu erkl\u00e4ren sind. Dies l\u00e4sst sich mit Blick auf die Arbeitsweise des Thukydides differenzieren, nutzt dieser doch Zahlen, um Sicherheit bzw. Unsicherheit von Wissen \u00fcber historische Abl\u00e4ufe zu verdeutlichen und um als Ma\u00dfstab f\u00fcr Erwartungen und Erfolgsaussichten der Beteiligten zu dienen.<\/p>\n"}],"section_language":[{"term_id":1078,"name":"Deutsch","slug":"deutsch","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1078,"taxonomy":"ht_section_language","description":"","parent":0,"count":132,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":1079,"name":"Englisch","slug":"englisch","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1079,"taxonomy":"ht_section_language","description":"","parent":0,"count":58,"filter":"raw"}]},"yoast_head":"\nThe Greeks and the Power of Numbers. 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